Professional Consulting Agreement Template (B100)

Who can use this professional appointment?

Any company or organisation can use this Appointment of Professional Consultant for a variety of development projects from a modest building to an office block or a shopping mall.  It is in a form that protects the interests of both parties and is acceptable to a consultant’s insurers

What is this contract for?

This is a comprehensive agreement suitable for the appointment of a wide range of professional consultants – architect, structural engineer, quantity surveyor,  services engineer, landscape consultant etc.  This is helpful for administrative reasons- namely you can engage all the professional team on the same Terms & Conditions.

What are the main issues?

Key legal issues for an appointment of a professional consultant are:

• Standard of care and duties of consultant – information/co-ordination with others/reporting/legal compliance/avoiding deleterious materials etc.
• What services are covered by the agreed fee and what is the process for additional services
• Copyright in designs and the rights of the client to use them
• Insurance – it is important that a professional firm maintains adequate insurance, in particular professional indemnity insurance
• Termination: apart for terminating for breach of contract, a client should have the right to terminate at any time in case, for example, planning consent is not given for the development
• Price – is there a fixed price with a payment schedule or is the fee paid in monthly instalments
• Collateral warranties: if the client is going to ned them, the appointment should say so.

What detailed terms does the professional appointment contain?

The main points cover:

• definitions and interpretation
• appointment
• commencement & term
• scope of services & duties of consultant
• fees & payment
• additional services
• copyright licence
• professional indemnity insurance
• assignment & subcontracting
• warranties
• termination
• suspension
• confidentiality
• notices
• resolution of disputes
• governing law
• previous agreement
• rights of third parties
• partnership

There are four schedules to be completed, detailing the description of the project and client’s appointment brief, detailed services, fees and a form of collateral warranty deed.

For more information on each of these sections, see our Explanatory Notes  which you will  receive when you download the document from our website.

For information on signing documents see our Contract Signing page

When I download the document, can I change it and/or use it more than once?

Yes, all ContractStore’s templates are in MS Word and you can use the contract on more than one project. For more information, watch the video on this page of our website or see our FAQs

Legal support

ContractStore supplies templates and is not a law firm.  But experienced lawyers write all our templates, so we can arrange legal assistance for customers who need special terms in one of our documents or a bespoke template.  For more information see our Legal Services page.  For more information see our Legal Services page.

Contract Author – Giles Dixon

And if you want to contact us see our Contacts page.